


Heart awoken, life changed

by Gaia_bing



Category: Spartacus Series (TV), Spartacus: Vengeance, Spartacus: War of the Damned
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, First Kiss, First Meetings, First Time, Fluff and Angst, M/M, painter!Agron
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-28
Updated: 2014-07-28
Packaged: 2018-02-10 18:59:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2036388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gaia_bing/pseuds/Gaia_bing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Agron and his passion is rejected for what seems like the nth time, he begins having doubts with himself. That is, until he meets someone that will give him just what he needs to get his creative juice working again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Heart awoken, life changed

**Author's Note:**

> Just an FYI, this story is based on true events...sort of. Just replace Spartacus and paintings with my own consciousness and fanfics, and you've pretty much got what happened. This is not a pity party on myself, just something I wanted to share.

"Hmm...hmm...uhuh...Interesting..." a man in clean jeans and a white T-shirt mumbled to himself as he looked at pictures after pictures, his eyebrows ascending at some and descending at others.

Another man, this one wearing a black dress shirt and flawless work pants, felt his legs tremble lightly from where he had been sitting for the past fifteen minutes or so. The "Spartura" gallery was **the** up-and-coming painting gallery in town. If he could get his work exposed there, even for a little while, he just knew that it'd lead to bigger and better things. More exposure would mean more notoriety, which in itself would mean more demand for his work, which itself would mean more revenue from it and maybe, finally, he could live off his one and true passion...

"Agron?" the man in front of him and one of the owners of the gallery, a friendly fellow with short hair and clear blue eyes, called out and that made the slightly nervous man shake himself out of his reveries.

"Um, I'm sorry Sir...huh...Mr. Voight...uhm Sir."

Spartacus raised a hand and smiled as he reassured the other man by saying: "It's alright. And you don't have to call me Mr. Voight. Please, you can call me Spartacus, like all of my friends do."

Agron's ears perked up at that sentence. He wanted to be called by his first name? Did this mean that the man liked his work and that he actually stood a chance?

"Yes...yes, Si...uh, sorry, Spartacus. You wanted to ask me something?" Agron asked, daring himself to get a little bit excited.

"Yes, actually. Before I saw you swimming inside your own head just now, I wanted to ask you if this portfolio contained all of your work, or if you had any other paintings that you haven't put in pictures just yet." Spartacus asked the other man, adjusting his glasses on the tip of his nose.

"Uhm, well, no, actually. These are pictures of all of the paintings that I've done ever since I graduated Art School a couple of years ago. Why do you want to know if there are any others? Aren't the ones pictured in there good enough?" Agron asked the other man confusedly and his earlier hopes were brought lower and lower toward the ground with each word and each sentence that he heard the gallery owner say to him next:

"Well, they are all good. I think some of them are pretty great, actually. It's just that...my wife and I, in our gallery, whenever we expose an artist's work for future buyers to see, we like to see his or her complete vision of the world around them. But all that I can see in this portfolio, is either a bunch of fruits inside a bowl laying on a table or flowers inside a vase laying on the exact same table. This is the kind of work that school students do for their homework, not by artists that want to succeed out there. And you do know you're not in Art School anymore, right?

You need to have more variety in your painting subjects, Agron, otherwise people are just going to get bored at seeing your art and they won't be interested into procuring more. Now, don't get me wrong, I love dead nature paintings and there is a public for that sort of stuff, but it is a very limited one.

As for myself, when I want to expose that sort of thing, I take maybe one or two paintings from various artists, not the complete work of just one person. Either you lack the inspiration to pick something other than fruits or flowers on a table as a subject, or you lack the skills to paint anything else. You seem like a really nice guy, Agron, you really do, but your work doesn't really fit our gallery, I'm really sorry about that. Come back when you have painted things other than dead nature and then maybe we'll talk."

**************

Agron was completely seething by the time he entered his studio apartment, dropping his portfolio on a nearby chair. Who did this guy think he was? Lack of inspiration?! Not enough variety!? He'd show this jackass that he could paint something other than dead nature. And then, he'd been groveling at Agron's feet in apology and simply insist that Agron let him expose his stuff inside his gallery.

Taking off his leather jacket and grabbing his painting material, Agron approached his eschel, where a blank canvas was hanging and with his black pencil, he began to draw forms and lines.

 _"Pssht, Art School homework my ass"_ , Agron thought to himself as he made his pencil glide along the white material. He just needed to share his vision to the rest of the world, like Spartacus had told him to. If before he had used fruits and flowers laying on his kitchen table as models for his work, then so what? He could do other stuff and with no models in sight, thank you very much. He just needed to let his mind and his hands speak for themselves and tell him and the world that...

That...

Agron froze as he took a step back and his face slumped in complete discouragement as he took a gander at what he'd begun to draw.

There, right on top of an imagined kitchen table, was laying a bunch of apples and bananas inside a bowl, just like all of the other stuff that he'd painted beforehand and that Spartacus had rejected just over an hour earlier.

*************

The sky was overcast as Agron was sitting dejectedly on his favorite park bench, feeling sorry for himself.

Spartacus had been right. He really was just an amateur that still did Art School homework stuff and nothing else. He really did lack the creativity to paint more than one subject and today definitely proved it to him. All of this time, he'd been using dead nature models for his work and the one time that he'd tried to do without and do something different for a change, the one thing that he and his mind could come up with...

Was the exact kind of thing that he'd been painting before.

Who was he kidding? No wonder Spartacus had been his fifth rejection in over a month. No wonder all of those people before that had said no to exposing his work. They really were all the same thing, over and over, just painted a little bit differently each time. There wasn't a vision of his world in them, there was just... copy and paste.

Agron sniffled softly and put his head in his hands. He really was a loser, wasn't he? He really couldn't paint anything else than dried flowers or fruits on a table, could he? He never was going to be able to live off his passion and nobody was ever going to like what he did and he sucked and he sucked and he sucked and he sucked and he...

Suddenly, as if the world had listened to his pitiful cries, a ray of sunlight slid between two giant grey clouds and illuminated a spot that was near to where Agron had been sitting. Adjusting his eyes to the slightly blinding light, Agron blinked as he looked toward where this sudden ray of light was hitting and his breath caught in his throat at what he saw.

There, on another nearby bench, was sitting another dejected looking man, just like he himself had been. His brown eyes was looking sadly at the cement laying in front of him and his long dark hair was slightly going back and forth along the sweeping breeze.

And when the dark eyes of the stranger looked up in his direction and stared into his green ones from afar, Agron felt his heart skip a beat and he couldn't help himself...

He smiled.

And the stranger smiled back.

**************

"So, this is where the magic happens, huh?" the stranger, that Agron had come to know as Nasir, while conversing with him inside that park that day, learning that a bad break-up was what had caused the other man's chagrin and with whom he quickly became friends within the span of a few short weeks, exclaimed while walking around the painting area of his studio apartment, beer in hand, and checking out his different pieces of work.

Agron took a sip of his own beer and scratched the back of his head as he replied: "Yeah, it is. Or was, actually..."

Nasir turned around and looked at the other man with curiosity in his eyes. "Really? You told me that this was your passion. Why have you stopped?" he asked his friend.

"Well, uhm, just before I met you, I got my fifth rejection in like a month to expose my work somewhere and uh, the guy's words really got to me and made me realize just how not good at painting I really was. And so, I haven't picked up a paint brush since." Agron admitted, scratching the back of his neck once more and looking down pitifully.

Nasir raised an eyebrow and said as he looked at Agron's work more closely: "Well, from what I'm seeing, you're actually a great painter. The details, the colors, everything looks just fine in my book."

"Yeah, well, tell that to the guy who said that I didn't have the skills or the creativity to do anything else than paint dead nature after dead nature and that I didn't show my vision of the world through my painting. And he's right, you know? The only thing that I've been painting my whole life has either been fruits or flowers on tables. And the one time that I tried to do something different and let my imagination run wild, I came up with the exact same thing that I usually do." Agron sighed, still looking downwards.

He was about to turn around and try to change the subject when he heard footsteps coming closer to where he had been standing and felt a hand cupping his chin tenderly.

"Well, I think the problem isn't your skills or your creativity, but with what you're working with. Ever tried to paint with a human model before?" Nasir asked him in a reassuring voice.

"Uhm, maybe once or twice back in Art School. But other than that, not really." Agron replied, swallowing thickly as he realized just how close Nasir was to him.

"Well, it wouldn't kill you to try it one more time. Now, would it?" Nasir asked him with a smile and Agron slightly smiled back as he answered:

"No, no it wouldn't."

**************

"Okay, lean your face a little bit to the left. No, my left, there. Now lift your arm over your head. Perfect. Stay in that position and I'll get started."

And this was how Agron and Nasir's little human modeling session got started. With Agron concentrating as he began to draw Nasir with his black pencil and the long haired man was laying on the raggedy couch that hid Agron's futon bed underneath it. He had changed into a bathrobe that Agron had lent him, while Agron was wearing...

A white wife-beater and torn-out jeans, his "work clothes" that he'd called them and they...they...

They were quite honestly the hottest pieces of clothing put on the hottest person Nasir had ever met in his entire life. Oh boy, he could feel himself starting to sweat underneath the bathrobe, just by staring at Agron, looking so focused in what he was doing, his tongue slightly out and his own beads of sweat running down his muscled arms and his devilishly handsome face. Nasir wanted to feel that tongue run all over his body and he also wanted to lick those beads off of Agron's own body and...

_"Nasir?"_

And...

_"Nasir?"_

And...

_"Nasir!"_

A hand waving over his face broke Nasir out of his lustful thoughts and looking up, he noticed that Agron had stopped what he'd been doing and was now staring at him curiously.

"Wh-what? What's wrong? Why did you stop?" Nasir finally asked, confusion written all over his face.

"I stopped because I'm finished with the drawing phase of my work. I don't need a model to do the rest, so...you're free to go if you want to." Agron explained with a small smile.

"Oh..." Nasir responded, looking a bit sad.

"Yeah." Agron added, looking down at the floor.

"But...what if I...what I didn't want to go? What if I wanted to...to stay and...?" Nasir dared to ask.

"You...you could stay. If you'd like..." Agron whispered, his face coming ever closer to Nasir's.

The long-haired licked his lips and closed his eyes as he whispered back:

"Oh, I'd love to. Believe me."

And suddenly, like moths drawn to an open flame, they fell on top of one another, ripping away wife beaters and bathrobes and underwear and torn-out jeans. They kissed and licked and touched and tasted and caressed and pulled and pushed and everything in between and at last, when Agron slid between Nasir's thighs and thrusted inside the warmest place he'd ever felt and his lips found their way back to Nasir's, only one thought came to his mind:

Boy was he happy to have been to that park that day.

**************

Nasir woke up the next morning, with the feeling of a fleece blanket put over him and the sight...

The sight of his new lover, naked as the day that he'd been born, once again diligently at work.

Agron smiled as he saw that his new companion had woken up. "Good morning." he whispered tenderly when Nasir walked up and embraced him from behind.

"Good morning to you." the other man gently replied, kissing the taller man's naked shoulder and looking at the now color-filled eschel. "Why did you get up so early? What is this? he added.

"Oh, just something that popped out of me in the middle of the night, that's all. It wouldn't leave me alone, so I let my heart and my hands do all of the painting." Agron explained as he wrapped an arm around Nasir's thinner shoulder.

Nasir stepped closer to what Agron had been working and looked at it in awe. It was so beautiful.

An ocean of grey and white and black and in the middle of it all, a shining ray of gold.

"What is it supposed to represent?" Nasir asked curiously.

"How I see you, particularly how I saw you the day that we first met. Like the ray of sunshine that fell on you inside that park, you're a shining light inside my life that drove away all the grey and negativity and gave me my confidence and my smile back." Agron admitted shyly.

"Oh, Agron." Nasir replied and his watery smile said everything that could be said.

And so, as Agron dropped his paint brush on the floor and the new lovers embraced once more, Agron's new piece and the first of many coming from his new creative swing, thanks to the new muse inside his life, to be included inside Spartacus' new exhibit a couple of months later, was left there to dry.

And the piece, what was it called?

_"Heart awoken, life changed."_

**Author's Note:**

> Lesson learned here: when in doubt with what you're doing, let your heart and not your mind do the talking, writing or painting.


End file.
